# Chapter 30
“Would you like to look for a place together later?”
“What?”
Woosang said awkwardly.
“I’m sorry. Please pretend you didn’t hear that.”
“No, it’s fine. I’m good at living with someone.”
“……”
He stood there with a strange expression for a moment before looking elsewhere. Wondering if I had made a mistake, I approached and asked again.
“In Paris? Or Berlin?”
“I wonder.”
I liked him answering playfully with a small smile. The memory that suddenly came to mind felt more painful.
I exhaled roughly. This wasn’t our home in the 7th district. I felt my mind becoming strangely clear.
‘Come to think of it, I wonder what happened to that house.’
That place had warmth, with light pouring in perfectly when sitting on the sofa. I loved that sofa that became full when the two of us sat on it.
I want to go back there. I wish there was a place to return to.
But I can never go back there again. I let go of Woosang twice, and both times it was the direction I chose myself.
Even if I were to return, Woosang probably wouldn’t trust me. And I don’t think I could trust myself either. An unstable relationship cannot last and shouldn’t be forced. Sadly, that was reality.
But I wanted to tell this living specter before me.
“…I.”
My breath became heavy. I spoke while holding it in tightly.
“I never wanted to leave from the beginning…”
I mumbled whatever came out of my mouth, wiping my tears and hitting my suffocating chest. Just then, I felt the man getting up indifferently despite my state.
Yes. I wish this man would kill me now. If I die, I would no longer be haunted by specters nor would I have to grieve missing Woosang.
I wish you would kill me painfully.
“Huh……”
A groan naturally escaped my lips. I wanted to lift my head to see who was standing in front of me, but I was afraid it might really be Woosang, so I couldn’t lift my head.
It was a dizzying thought.
Just then, a distinctly different sound echoed in my ears.
I guessed what the sound was while breathing heavily. But there was no pain in my body. Given the severe pain in my chest, I might have a hole in my chest.
I quickly raised my hand to feel around my chest. Unfortunately, there was no wound. Before my foolish thoughts ended, something hot and unidentifiable poured over my head.
When I raised my hand to feel it, red blood was flowing with a warm temperature. I couldn’t understand the current situation. Grabbing my unresponsive head, I forcibly lifted it.
I took a deep breath. A fishy smell penetrated through the air. My stomach, which I had just managed to calm, began to churn. Looking at the corpse in front of me, I reached out my hand to stroke it.
It was still warm. Just in case, I turned it over and fortunately, it wasn’t Woosang. But what did that matter?
“Fuck. I should have killed him later.”
“……”
Hund’s voice came from beyond the corpse. I tried to understand his words but soon gave up and wiped the blood from my face.
I inhaled and exhaled hard to clear my blocked breath. And finally, as I checked the man’s face, I blankly stared at the blood flowing through the hole that was wide open on his forehead.
“Well done, getting distracted.”
At Hund’s voice, I snapped back to my senses and recalled what I had done. I could have just lured him and knocked him out, but stupidly, I was thinking of something else and got counterattacked.
By an insignificant Asian. By an insignificant black-haired man.
My body trembled finely. I didn’t know if I was trembling because of my mistake or because I mistook this man for Woosang.
However, when I met Hund’s eyes, I could suddenly guess where this sensation came from. He was laughing his head off.
I couldn’t think of what to do with him, who was openly mocking me without even trying to hold back his laughter. There was nothing I could do.
“From where was it all an act?”
“Act? What are you saying? I didn’t make anything up.”
Lies. Otherwise, there wouldn’t be an alley where people don’t pass in this complex Paris. It was clearly deception to trick me.
Just to mess with me. What is he thinking?
This tired-looking Asian man might have died not because of money but because of Hund’s pranks. Of course, that fact wasn’t very important.
With misdirected anger and anxiety, I blinked and stared blankly until his smile disappeared. My troubled insides felt like they were turning over, making my throat burn.
“Why are you doing all this trouble?”
“Why do you think it’s trouble?”
“…You don’t have to do this.”
“Did you have the certainty that you wouldn’t run away from here even without doing this?”
Certainty. Such a clear word didn’t exist within me. If there’s anything I realized after meeting Woosang, it’s that I am a more complex person than I thought.
There are no clear and definite answers.
While thinking blankly, I recalled the real ‘Hund’ who raised me in the past. ‘Hund’ handled me well without doing such troublesome things and raised me that way.
This man seemed to want to tie me down like the past Hund. But that was close to impossible.
I hated this person who tried to control me at will. A malicious feeling I had never experienced before seemed to rise madly inside me. I was breathless and dizzy, but one emotion was clear.
I have to kill that man.
I had never thought about intentionally killing someone before. The fact that such a thought occurred to me was evidence that he had failed to possess me.
I didn’t understand what I was thinking. Surprised by my own emotions, I looked down at my hands. The trembling hands felt frightening.
What if I kill him? Where could I go as a complete murderer? I definitely couldn’t return to Woosang.
Just then, Hund grabbed the back of my neck and started dragging me somewhere. The surrounding scenery didn’t enter my eyes. It didn’t matter anyway. Hund’s face, as he finally pushed me into the car, looked peaceful.
“Just shut up.”
With those final words, he headed somewhere. In the ice-cold car, I curled up my body and breathed heavily.
I didn’t want to think about anything. Ugly emotions, nostalgic things, none of it was necessary.
After that, I couldn’t remember how I got home.
It seemed like Hund came back again and drove me to Brussels.
I must have fallen asleep after killing time blankly in the living room. After waking up in the morning, I looked down at my body and only then realized that I was covered in blood.
But I didn’t particularly want to wash myself, so I stayed there.
That’s how several days seemed to pass.
My blood-soaked body started to smell rotten, and the hardened blood began to flake off. Now, it really seemed like I should wash.
I don’t remember what state of mind I was in when I washed, but I cleaned off the blood that covered me thoroughly, and after that, I went into the bedroom and fell asleep again like a dead mouse.
Burning thirst and hunger woke me up intermittently, but after addressing them adequately and falling asleep, a whole day would have passed without me moving.
I didn’t feel anything. I didn’t want to feel anything.
***
“Ha….”
My throat was so dry that words couldn’t come out. I wasn’t clear what day it was today, or even what time it was.
I staggered over and opened the shelf.
There was nothing in it. When I opened the refrigerator, vegetables I didn’t remember buying had rotted and were dripping water.
I wanted to check the time, but I couldn’t even remember where my phone was. When I turned on the laptop in the house and checked the date, about two weeks had passed since I returned from Paris.
Not believing it, I counted the dates with my fingers, but it was a meaningless action since I had been immersed in sleep all day. Come to think of it, Hund hadn’t visited once during that time.
In the past, he would have visited once or twice a week, but seeing that he hadn’t come for two weeks, it seemed like he had lost interest in me.
It’s a fortunate thing, but perhaps it was unfortunate.
Just then, my stomach growled. I don’t want to do anything, but it seems my stomach is hungry.
I rubbed my hungry stomach and looked out the window. Compared to two weeks ago, the melted snow had made the ground dirty, and people were walking awkwardly between the snow.
“Now, what should I do…?”
I muttered blankly.
It wouldn’t be bad to die like this. But even if I were to die, I felt like I should eat something first.
A smile escaped. Death wasn’t scary, but hunger was.
I need to think about the future. Woosang’s specter no longer visited me, and neither did Hund.
Maybe on that day two weeks ago, I killed Woosang’s specter.
If so, I have to decide everything. Now that I’m completely alone, it seemed like I had to make some decisions.
Confusing thoughts came to mind. I suddenly felt scared too. After putting on proper clothes and grabbing my wallet, I looked at the mirror in the entryway.
The emaciated appearance was unfamiliar, so I stared into the eyes of myself in the mirror for a while. I couldn’t read any emotion in there. It had been so long since I faced myself directly in the mirror.
My appearance in the mirror was unpleasantly thin. I frowned at my own appearance.
“…Flesh.”
When I opened my mouth, a cracked voice leaked out. I coughed dryly through my sore throat.
If Woosang saw me like this, he would be horrified. The messy house. The refrigerator, not just empty but about to grow mold. Me, sunk in despair.
But thinking of him wasn’t as sad as I expected. The feeling that I would die without him seemed to have disappeared along with that time two weeks ago.
I wish both Hund and Woosang would forget me. Then nothing would be left for me. I wanted to be free like that.
Now everything was so tiresome.
I didn’t like being surprised by my own emotions or living a life controlled by someone else. I needed a life where I exist as myself.
For the first time in my life, I thought I wanted to exist as a human being, as myself.
I quietly moved away from the mirror and opened the door. Seeing the outside, which was brighter than I expected, tears somehow flowed out.
Even now, having lost everything, I had to live on. I think I want to try living. There was still no certainty about anything.
“I have to go.”
I deliberately recited aloud. That’s how I wanted to welcome a new beginning.
